Shows Fail To Attract * Allentown Fair Concerts Don't Lure Same Huge Country Music Crowds They Had In '95.

September 04, 1996|by DAN HARTZELL, The Morning Call

It's been a "bummer summer" for concerts in general -- a factor that helped hold down attendance at the Allentown Fair's grandstand shows this year, according to fair officials.

Marketing Director Bonnie Brosious said about 17,000 fewer fans turned out to see Wynonna, Travis Tritt, Brooks & Dunn, Michael Bolton and the other headliners this year, as opposed to 1995's lineup.

"We had two sellouts last year, and one that was very close," she said of the '95 list that also was dominated by country music performers, including Reba McEntire and Alabama.

Despite a "USA Today" story on Thursday story showing country music album sales and touring revenues down for the first half of 1996 after many years of soaring popularity, Brosious declined to blame the grandstand's declining attendance on this year's predominant genre.

"Two of our most successful shows were country shows," she said, citing Brooks & Dunn (8,253 in attendance) and Travis Tritt and Marty Stuart (5,706). Wynonna and BlackHawk, however, drew a smaller crowd of 3,342.

While Crosby, Stills & Nash, a harmonizing rock band from the 1970s, pulled in a respectable 4,324 mostly graying fans, a rock act aimed at the younger set -- Gin Blossoms and Goo Goo Dolls -- drew a disappointing 3,695, Brosious said.

"I will not book a rock show on the opening night of high school football ever again," she said, blaming the paltry crowd for Gin Blossoms on the lure of the teen-age social scene.

But Brosious said there's no plan, nor any reason, to cut back on the country acts, which actually were pared by one this year, compared to last.

"Country music lovers love fairs, they go out and enjoy the fair; as long as country music produces that type of fair-goer, we're going to be having it here," she said.

The real issue is whether the concert market, and particularly the summer season, is overheat from the demand for shows in arenas, stadiums and open-air amphitheaters, pushing out smaller ancillary markets like that represented by the fair, Brosious said.

"The artists started increasing the size of their productions that can be held in arenas ... they are in such demand, and there are so many places to play that prices just go through the roof. This summer, it just seems to have crashed," with many people deciding to stay home and listen to CDs, Brosious said.

The lowest-cost reserved seat for a concert in the grandstand this year was $21.

Brosious declined to say how much artists charge to stage their shows, except to say that it's "six figures" for the major acts, "and they get a percentage."

She said the fair lost money on the concerts this year, but that is not unusual.

"We characteristically do not make money on the shows," she said. "We made money in 1994 and '95, and the last time before that was '85."

Brosious said she and other fair officials will discuss the state of major concert productions at the next meeting of the trade association to which the fair belongs.

"The only thing we can maybe do is structure the deals to protect ourselves better," she said, declining to elaborate.

In general, Brosious said the fair had good, if unremarkable attendance this year, both overall and at the grandstand shows. The overall gate for 1996 is estimated at 687,000, or 2.4 percent lower than 1995's record of 704,000. Final paid-attendance figures for this year are not available, Brosious said.

The price of admission went up by $1, to $4 this year, the first increase since 1983, she said.

Dan Wuchter, owner of the Fairgrounds Farmers Market and a food-seller at the fair, agreed.

"Last year was like a peak year," he said. "This year was a regular year."

Besides, Brosious said, "We don't want the (grandstand) shows to overshadow the agriculture at the fair. We had more home, garden and farm exhibitors than ever before."